Just some sleep for Christmas gift

Every year about this time, we are bombarded with Christmas music from every angle.

We hear holiday-themed music from our radios. We hear holiday-themed music in every store we visit. We hear holiday-themed music from out televisions. We hear holiday-themed music in our favorite bars.

By the time Christmas rolls around, most of us are heartily sick of holiday music.

But there are Christmas songs that, despite ourselves, we find ourselves listening to each time they come on whatever device.

“Grandma got run over by a reindeer” is one of those timeless classics that we just must listen to when it comes on the radio.

“Jingle Bell Rock” is another that fits that category.

And still another is the childlike classic “All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth.”

It is the last that prompts me to release my own wish list for the Christmas season.

All I want for Christmas is:

The will to do what it takes to lose 30 pounds.

Between my Mountain Dew addiction and the love affair between my butt and my desk chair, I have watched my weight balloon to heretofore unseen heights.

Every time I think I’ve found a way to drop some of those unwanted pounds, more work gets piled on, Holly takes in another foster child, the yard gets out of control, or my body just runs out of steam.

What I want is someone who can, and will, yell at me like a drill sergeant to get my posterior out of the desk chair and go for a walk for lunch instead of a hamburger. Or someone who will search out and destroy all my hidden stashes of Mountain Dew wherever they may be found.

A good salesperson that can get us off the road.

We’ve had salespeople in the last six years, only one of whom was actually effective. And we’ve had what looked like some good ones come to the door only to turn into a bar-stool hugger, or a late sleeper, or a live-on-the-handed-down-laurels salesperson.

I’ve also lost some promising numbers in the disaster area that is my desk. If FEMA paid money for disorganization, I would be in the running. For those whose numbers I have lost, take this as an invitation to contact me again. Please.

A timer-driven coffee pot.

This sounds like a rather frivolous request, but I used to drink way more coffee than Mountain Dew. I drink it black with no milk or sugar. There were zero calories in my coffee.

But the will to take the time to clean, load and brew a pot of coffee has left me. Things get so busy that I just don’t take the time to brew a good cup of coffee. We have an office neighbor who makes coffee daily, but, no offense intended, I can only drink one cup and I’m wired beyond my ability to cope. It’s sort of like drinking Italian espresso all afternoon and trying to go down for a nap.

With a coffee pot that begins to brew itself, the burden of taking the time to do so is lifted. I would still have to clean and load the machine, but that time would be saved by just showing up and pouring a cup.

Two days of uninterrupted sleep.

I am somewhat ashamed to be asking for something this selfish. But I must. With the arrival of our new five-year-old, we have taken to getting up way too early to get him off to school. To be honest, Holly does most of that, but I usually awaken.

And most of you know that I am not a morning person. I can get to bed at 2 a.m. as long as I don’t have to rise before 8 a.m. and I can function just fine. But even if I get to bed at 10 p.m. and get awakened at 6 a.m. and I’ve had the daily recommended eight hour dose of sleep, I just can’t function well enough to find the will to do the other things I have on my wish list for Christmas.

Just two days. I don’t think that’s too much to ask. At least until I try and decide what it is I can skip that must be done so I can get two days of sleep.

Must go to work Monday through Thursday. Need to go to work Friday. In season there are events nearly every Saturday, plus the current cleaning of the shed project, the correct the yard project, the oil changes for the vehicles project, the fix the broken barstools at the house project, the re-run the wires at the office project, the change the stickers on the delivery boxes project, the put the new aerator hose on the boat project, the learn how to use the hand-held GPS project, the rebuild the old laptop project, the finish the pea rock of the yard project, and other projects I’m quite certain I have forgotten.

That leaves Sunday. The list above explains why Sunday is out. Monday starts things all over again.

So Santa, if you’re reading, bring me good dose of over-the-counter sleep aides that will knock me unconscious for two days and make me forget the reasons why sleep is overrated.

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